


too old to be making the same mistakes

by youcouldmakealife



Series: if all is enough [7]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-26
Updated: 2015-03-26
Packaged: 2018-03-19 19:20:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3621306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Can I come in?” Rousseau asks. It’s a bad fucking idea, but Ulf knows he’s going to let him in anyway.</p><p>“This is a bad fucking idea,” Ulf says, however, because that is important.</p>
            </blockquote>





	too old to be making the same mistakes

In an ideal world, that’s it. 

Ulf goes to practice, and him and Rousseau look at each other with the split second acknowledgement of ‘oh, I’ve put his genitalia in my mouth’, and then they can have the professional relationship that they decidedly have not had so far.

Rousseau still doesn’t say much, and Ulf still needles him in ways he shouldn’t, but they run down the season and then Ulf considers his options, because he’s getting old and they’re more and more limited by the hour. 

Ulf tells Marc, and Marc is sour-faced because he can’t pull out ‘I told you so’, which is his favourite sentence in any language. Ulf would not be surprised if Marc learned it in Swedish for the optimal moment. 

Ulf gets it out of his system.

*

Instead, Ulf goes to practice, and Rousseau isn’t looking at him, which doesn’t mean anything, because when Rousseau looks at him, Ulf always catches that look out of the corner of his eye. Rousseau isn’t looking, but Ulf is looking at him, even when he shouldn’t be, even when he doesn’t want to, baldly staring, because he knows what Rousseau looks like if you shake the rest of it off.

Ulf has fucked up.

Outside of a few one night stands who leveraged their knowledge of his career into some stalking (security, very used to overzealous fans, tended to dispatch them quickly), Ulf has had a pretty undramatic romantic—well, sex life. There are some glaring exceptions—the couple who he'd been fucking (separately, and with full knowledge from both parties, he'd like it to be known), who stuck him in the middle of a nasty divorce. The two idiotic, foolish, unrequited emotional affairs with unavailable men.

The blot of the Rookie Situation, which led to a fairly hasty trade, aforementioned rookie going back and playing in the KHL for a year, and a very hostile Panthers bench, among other things, until the kid came back to the NHL. To Ulf's great relief, and not just because it took some of the venom out of the Panthers—he was a good kid, and a fragile one, and—okay, Ulf is starting to understand Marc's anger about Rousseau.

The uniting factor was repeated dalliances, though Ulf has had plenty that have remained friendly, easygoing. A repeated thread of the idiocy of fucking fellow hockey players, and Ulf knows that 'but he isn't one any _more_ ' is about the most feeble excuse in the history of excuses, can't even pass muster with himself, let alone make it out his mouth without losing steam before it passes his teeth.

This being a roundabout way of saying that while Ulf hoped fucking Rousseau would get it out of his system, it's done the opposite—let it infiltrate him, sink into his marrow.

This being a roundabout way of saying that Ulf is really too old to be making the same mistakes. 

*

The holding pattern continues, and it’s probably a good thing that they hit the road a couple days later, a swing through Quebec and Ontario. Ulf doesn’t know what the hell he’s supposed to tell Marc if Marc asks, doesn’t want to face the disappointed look, which seems to have improved since he reached fatherhood, or just works better on Ulf. He decides he isn’t going to say anything unless he’s specifically asked, and that doesn’t end up being a problem, because Marc waits for him outside the room after the game, but he’s drooping, and doesn’t even argue when Ulf offers to drive them back, which is a terrible sign, because Marc is stupidly protective of his ridiculous mid-life crisis car.

Ulf gets back from Marc’s before curfew -- he’d probably be granted some leniency, since it isn’t like he went out clubbing, but Charlotte is sick or just grumpy, and bawled constantly, except when Dan took her for a drive. She may have bawled then too, but it was blissfully quiet in the house for half an hour. Marc made them look like idiots on the ice, per usual, but off the ice he’s exhausted, wrung out. He almost fell asleep into his plate at dinner, and the only reason he didn’t was because Dan, apparently psychic or used to situational narcolepsy, nudged it out of the way.

Ulf knows Marc loves him, but he has no doubt that right now Marc loves sleep even more dearly, so he heads out earlier than he had planned after confiscating Marc’s glass of wine for his own personal use and marching him in the direction of bed. He considers waking Dan up from where he’s asleep on the couch, but Charlotte’s asleep on him, and Ulf is slightly frightened of her, and definitely frightened of waking her up, so instead he puts a blanket on him and thanks everything that Dan’s slack-jawed sleeping face doesn’t do anything for him.

After that it’s a matter of calling a cab, using his fractured, accented French until dispatch switches to English with an eye roll Ulf can almost hear, and chugging the rest of the wine with one wary eye to where Dan and Charlotte are sleeping. He locks up behind himself, and is back to his room mostly sober and very tired.

It’s odd seeing Marc with a life outside him. Or, that’s not accurate -- Marc has always had a life outside Ulf, but Ulf was party to it, got Christmas cards from his parents and sort of fucked his husband for a few years, shared a locker room and a book list and a mutual agreement to pretend neither of them cried during Les feluettes. Ulf has been entrenched in Marc’s life since he was picked up from Dallas, despite the fact he sent Dan down to the minors in doing so. This, Ulf has no touchstone for. This is a crying child Ulf doesn’t know how to quiet, and exhaustion he has no answer for, makes him feel like an outsider with Marc for the first time. 

He’s not in a great mood when he gets back to the hotel, and in an even worse mood because he’s unimpressed with his own internal reasoning, but fundamentally powerless to override it. Today, he isn’t much enamoured with any iteration of himself, desperate for praise and attention, like a small child or a dog. 

Ulf’s back ten minutes when there’s a knock on the door, and Ulf wouldn’t be surprised to be conscripted into Mario Kart at this point in the night. Might welcome it. It’s Rousseau instead, looking characteristically serious. 

“If you’re scratching me, save it for the morning,” Ulf says.

Rousseau doesn’t roll his eyes, but he looks like he wants to. “Can I come in?” Rousseau asks. It’s a bad fucking idea, but Ulf knows he’s going to let him in anyway.

“This is a bad fucking idea,” Ulf says, however, because that is important. The team’s on this floor, anyone could wander out for a Mario Kart championship or a walk or a smoke late enough not to be caught, and could find Rousseau at his door long past any time it would be appropriate. Find Rousseau leaving later than anyone should be on a travel night, let alone management.

Rousseau shrugs, jerky, which doesn’t suit him. Ulf knows how fluid he is. On the ice he was controlled force, every action instinctive, graceful, enough to outpace and outshine any defender trying to catch up. In bed he’s controlled force. It’s the rest of the time that doesn’t work, when he’s on solid land, tucked into a suit with slicked back hair, a business man. His skin doesn’t seem to fit him. 

Ulf wants him terribly like this, but mostly he wants to muss the entire image, find that honesty that he’d always seen on the ice. On the ice, Rousseau wasn’t afraid of anyone. Ulf will flatter himself to think that he got as much under Rousseau’s skin as anyone out there, but that never stopped Rousseau from capitalizing. Off the ice, Ulf thinks he might scare Rousseau, and that is a shitty feeling he wants no part of.

Ulf likes to think he’s a pretty smart guy, so he’s well aware of what Rousseau’s here for, but he steps out of the way, asks anyway, gets as far as “So what are--” before Rousseau’s mouth is on his, kicking the door shut behind him. Ulf spares a moment to be impressed by the smoothness of that, but then he gets distracted by Rousseau’s teeth in his lip, the way Rousseau’s hair is soft under his fingers when he raises a hand, like he showered the gel out but put the suit back on to walk the halls.

Ulf refuses to be endeared by that, but he appreciates taking it off him, unbuttoning the shirt backwards until Rousseau gets impatient with him and does it himself, nudges Ulf back with a pointed look towards Ulf’s shirt that Ulf takes in the spirit intended and strips off. He’d shucked the button-up as soon as he’d gotten back to his room, so he’s got the leisure of watching Rousseau, fastidious, first the front, then his cuffs, finally folding the shirt and laying it and his jacket on the chair by the door. He’s much the same with his suit pants, coiling the belt and folding them, while Ulf’s decided nudity is the better part of valor and gotten on the bed, a lazy hand around himself as he waits. He’d think Rousseau was doing it as a tease if he didn’t seem so focused. The only time Rousseau falters is with his thumbs tucked in his briefs, but all it takes is a raised eyebrow and he’s dropping them, cheeks lit up, flushed down his chest again, and Ulf has no idea what he has to be embarrassed about, because he’s a picture like that, ungelled hair falling across his forehead as he ducks his head, red, probably fever hot to the touch where he’s blushing, half-hard, the head of his cock flushed even darker than his cheeks where it’s peeking through his foreskin.

“You’re fucking gorgeous,” Ulf says, and Rousseau, if possible, goes even darker, but it brings him to the bed, and then it’s a matter of curling his free hand around Rousseau’s wrist, pulling him down for a kiss. Rousseau isn’t self-conscious once his mouth is occupied, not indecisive, and he’s the one who deepens in, moves to straddle Ulf’s thighs while Ulf tucks his hands around his hips to steady him as their cocks brush in a dry grind. 

It shouldn't be enough to get off like that, rough friction, inexact until Rousseau gets a hand around them, and then relentless, more the kind of shit he got up to as a rookie in Dallas, just pleased he was getting off somewhere other than in his pants, but there’s something about the way Rousseau’s hips flex under the tight clasp of Ulf’s hands, the way he’s ducked back and has bottom lip between his teeth, his eyes on where they rub against one another, sticky dry and Ulf’s got lube in his bag, should probably stop proceedings so neither of them are feeling chafed tomorrow, but he doesn’t want to interrupt when he can watch Rousseau take his pleasure, long lashes fanning over eyes that are all pupil, darker than black. 

Rousseau comes first, slicks Ulf’s cock, belly, trembling above him while Ulf holds him steady, but he steadies himself soon enough, scoots out of Ulf’s grasp, and Ulf’s got a protest on his lips when Rousseau ducks down and takes him into his mouth where he’s sticky with pre-come and Rousseau’s come, and that -- he has no protests as Rousseau’s tongue curls against the head, tasting himself.

He takes Ulf deep, nose almost pressed against Ulf’s skin, so that all he can probably smell is himself, and that’s almost as hot as his mouth itself, vicious again, in what seems to be a trend Ulf has no complaints about. He generally has pretty decent stamina, but Rousseau is both intent and successful on dismantling that, so it’s sooner than Ulf is proud of when he says, “Adam,” because it seems pretty rude to use someone’s surname when they’ve got your dick in their mouth.

Rousseau doesn’t pull off, swallows around him until Ulf feels wrung dry, and rolls off to the side of the bed, close enough to touch, though Ulf’s not sure he should, because Rousseau’s got his back to him. It’s quiet for a minute as they both catch their breaths, and Ulf is waiting for Rousseau to get up as soon as his breathing evens out, maybe avoid looking at Ulf entirely now that they’ve both gotten off.

“You fucked him?” Rousseau asks, and Ulf watches the broad expanse of his back, the minute shift of the muscles under his skin.

“Who?” Ulf asks.

“Lapointe,” Rousseau says.

“What, tonight?” Ulf laughs. “Yeah, with a crying baby soundtrack.”

Rousseau doesn’t turn, but Ulf can tell he’s getting a look. 

‘No’ isn’t exactly the truth, but ‘yes’ isn’t right either. “Not really,” Ulf says.

Rousseau turns slightly. “Not really,” he says flatly. Ulf’s aware of how ridiculous it sounds.

“He’s my best friend,” Ulf says, which isn’t an answer except for how it is. 

Rousseau looks him in the eye. It shouldn’t be anything, except Ulf doesn’t know if Rousseau’s ever done that before. 

Explaining the tangled knot that is his and Marc’s platonic relationship, his and Dan’s decidedly not platonic relationship, and Dan and Marc’s grossly domestic true fucking love relationship isn’t his place, especially since Rousseau knows Marc. Also, selfishly, he doesn’t feel like it, not with Rousseau in his bed again, tousled and golden, though looking increasingly unimpressed with his existence.

“Come here,” he says instead, brushes his fingertips against Rousseau’s shoulderblade. Rousseau doesn’t cringe, which Ulf half expected, but he does pull away after a minute, sits up. 

“I should go,” he says, and Ulf doesn’t argue, because he shouldn’t be here in the first place. He would have shut it down, but he didn’t want to. His dick has led him to unfortunate and inopportune places before, and he’s not ashamed of it, exactly, but it’s exactly the sort of thing he thinks Rousseau would be ashamed of, so he’s not going to make things worse, not going to encourage it, though he thinks it might be too late for that resolution, because he encouraged it, guided it every step of the way.

Ulf gets dressed when Rousseau does, at least briefs and a shirt so he can walk him to the door, because something instinctively kicks out against tucking himself in bed while Rousseau puts himself back together in perfect place to walk down the hall. Rousseau has more pieces to pull himself together with, so Ulf watches him in the reverse of the impromptu strip tease earlier, the flex of his back when he pulls his undershirt on, then more subtle movements as he buttons up his dress shirt, the way it pulls tight against his shoulders when he ties his shoes. Rousseau catches him watching, but Ulf isn’t ashamed of frank admiration -- he’s got an athlete’s body, hasn’t lost it even a little, and Ulf isn’t dead. 

When Rousseau’s dressed, Ulf follows him the half dozen steps to the door, tucks a stray lock of hair behind Rousseau’s ear, because it mars the picture he wants to present, but mostly because he wants to.

Rousseau lets him, body still and tense, face unmoving. “You’re probably gonna be scratched tomorrow,” he says, and when Ulf stares at him, he cracks a sliver of a smile.

“Is that you joking?” Ulf asks, and Rousseau doesn’t say a thing, just walks out, and it’s not like Ulf can call down to him, it’s the middle of the goddamn night.

“Fucker,” Ulf says, shutting the door, and pretends to himself he isn’t smiling.


End file.
